April's theme is a special one - "Write a critique of a past Writers Jam post"! Please be constructive. It can be your own post or someone else's, the goal is to get some healthy discussion going!
Famous last words, quite literally. The theme for March 2026 is "How will we ever get out of this labyrinth?" The labyrinth is a motif that appears throughout human history and literature as recreation, punishment, incarceration, suffering, bureaucracy, stagnation… Write about self-exploration, the state of the world, getting stuck or going in circles. Show us your most creative labyrinth metaphor!
Suggested reading:
The theme for February is 2 + 2 = 5. You are encouraged to get creative with the theme.
This edition's theme comes from a popular refrain from George Orwell's dystopian classic Nineteen Eighty Four. It is one of the slogans used by the Party in the book to further their ideas. If you haven't read the book already, I urge you to do so this month (if you need to figure out how you can read it, let one of the admins know).
Write about mathematics as sedition, or about controlling the masses. Tell us how you feel about the world right now. Is two plus two five already?
This is a longer theme than usual. I'm experimenting with this format of the description where I include ideas to get you started. Do let us know how you like it!
Suggested reading:
You are encouraged to get creative with the theme. Write about beginnings old and new, about ushering in the new year or about the ends of ones long past. Or about about creation and destruction, or the Taylor Swift song. Come celebrate this New Beginning of Writers Jam with us.
A bit topical given the recent news :P You are encouraged to get creative with the theme. Write about lost loves, Writers Jam, the Taj Mahal, Sonnet Fifty-Five, or something else entirely. What temples live in your memory?
You are encouraged to get creative with the theme. Talk about the relief away from work or the dread of visiting parents. How everything feels so different; whether the lit lamp feels dimmer these days. Do the firecrackers seem as bright when you're an adult?
You are encouraged to get creative with the theme. Talk about long-distance friendships, the invention of telephony, the dreams of a handset, or something else entirely. Do telephones dream of electric sheep?
You are encouraged to get creative with the theme. Interpret it however you like—it could be the first line of your piece, a fictional exploration, a dialogue within your work, an essay on the phrase itself, anything at all.
You are encouraged to get creative with the theme. Write about the webs we weave of each other, being together at the end of the world, Bacon numbers, or something else entirely. What more is there to life than the people that surround us?
You are encouraged to get creative with the theme. Write about the grand, the cosmic, or the mundane. A mother and her child or small talk in the town square. Love across the ages, this blue marble we live on, or something else entirely. What does it really mean to be us ?
You are encouraged to get creative with the theme. Write about the humble lotus drawing its life from the mud that surrounds it. Write about staying silly at your dreary corporate job. Write about the indomitable human spirit charging on through the worst life has to offer. We'd love to hear your tales of persistence.
You are encouraged to get creative with the theme. Reminisce about a childhood vacation, write about a family photo album, tell us about your time riding public transport, or try something else entirely. After all, what is life but a series of memories in transit?
You are encouraged to get creative with the theme. Write about failed relationships, the woodcutter and his axes, personal ambitions, capitalist greed, or simply that hollow feeling we all get sometimes.
You are encouraged to get creative with the theme. Write about global warming, events that would set your personal life ablaze, a burning toy globe, or something else entirely. The world is your (flaming) oyster.
You are encouraged to get creative with the theme. Write about lost childhoods, a nightmare clown's basement prison, moving to a different country, or something else entirely. In the words of Gregory David Roberts:
"It’s said that you can never go home again, and it’s true enough, of course. But the opposite is also true. You must go back, and you always go back, and you can never stop going back, no matter how hard you try."
You are encouraged to get creative with the theme. Write about your favourite t-shirt, a special sea-shell from the beach, a portrait of someone near and dear, or something else entirely. There is lots to find when you know how to look.
You are encouraged to get creative with the theme. Write a poem that reads differently top to bottom and bottom to top, two separate stories side-by-side, a reflection the House M.D. episode, or tell the same events from two different perspectives.
You are encouraged to get creative with the theme. Talk about food, or the types of love you've experienced, or family drama… give your reader a taste of what love is like.
This is not a format restriction - you can still submit poem, short story, play. You are encouraged to get creative with the theme. Write about mad scientists, a nostalgia trip to one's own past, a bureaucrat processing visas, a wizard in another realm hurtling into the future… or something else entirely. All of time is yours for the taking.
You are encouraged to get creative with the theme. Write about the Katy Perry song, a cricket ball that ended a match, a lost career opportunity… Anything, or anyone, that slipped through your fingers.
You can interpret that however you like—it could be the first line of your piece, a literal reflection, a fictional exploration, a dialogue, an essay on the phrase itself, anything at all.